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Whole Foods Mixes Up Chicken, Vegan Salads

SAN FRANCISCO - FEBRUARY 22: The Whole Foods logo adorns a cardboard box at a Whole Foods Market February 22, 2007 in San Francisco, California. Whole Foods Market Inc. announced that it plans to purchase Wild Oats Market Inc. for an estimated $565 million in hopes of competing with larger food chains that have started to introduce organic and prepared foods to their inventories. (Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)file photo (credit: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)

AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — Whole Foods Market Inc. said Thursday that labels on a chicken salad and those on a vegan version of the salad were reversed at some of its cold food bars in the Northeast.

The mislabeled salads — a curried chicken salad and a vegan curried “chick’n” salad — were sold in 15 stores in Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Jersey and New York, Whole Foods said. They were sold on Tuesday and Wednesday.

The Food and Drug Administration noted the vegan salad contains soy, and the curried chicken salad contains egg. It said people who have an allergy or severe sensitivity to soy or eggs run the risk of serious or life-threatening allergic reaction if they eat the salads.

The company, based in Austin, Texas, said no illnesses have been reported.

The grocery store operator has hot and cold food bars where customers can scoop food into containers, which are then weighed at the registered.

Libba Letton, a spokeswoman for Whole Foods, said some of the company’s bulk food comes pre-made from third-party vendors. She said the salads in question came with the wrong labels from a vendor. In addition to issuing a recall in line with guidelines set by the FDA, Letton said the company has posted signs in its stores alerting people of the error.